Thursday, October 05, 2006
emerging churches are local churches
“The people I talked to at [Jacobs Well] had never heard of Emergent or of McLaren.” Great quote from an excellent article in Christian Century about Jacobs Well, an emerging church in Kansas City.
It takes a good hard look at a local church; their love of arts and home grown music, their love of place and awareness of context, their breadth of ecumenical relationships and commitment to authenticity.
We need lots and lots of stories like this – stories of local churches doing local mission. That is emerging church. I contrast this with yet another email, sent to me overnight by an American fundamentalist, bagging some abstract category called “emerging church.”
What a waste of his time. “Emerging” will never be found in books or blogs or conferences. It is found as local Christians seek to Incarnate Christ in their local neighbourhoods.
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“…becoming more aware of what a Christian community is as a society of friends, aware of the gracious hospitality and presence of God-with-us and travelling together as a pilgrim people inviting others to join us on this journey. It is about being aware of having our own stories of life integrated within a much richer and fuller epic, the Story of God. It is about offering to others the opportunity to have their own stories located in a way far more substantial and significant than the limited narratives that have emerged in late modernity. It is about talking up the significance of ordinary people’s lives as part of a cosmic and indeed eternal drama.”
John Thompson: Church on Edge?
That can only be done in the local…:)
Comment by Nigel — October 6, 2006 @ 2:09 am
Interesting article
Comment by Matt Stone — October 8, 2006 @ 4:23 pm